Disaster

As per news reports dated June 7, 2017, the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB) has approved a grant to Haiti to cover the country's 2017-2018 parametric insurance premiums with CCRIF SPC (formerly the Caribbean Catastrophe Risk Insurance Facility). The Bank will provide $3.5 million (for the fifth consecutive year) to meet the cost of the premiums for tropical cyclones, earthquake and excess rainfall coverage on this insurance premium account. CDB has further committed for continual support through regular parametrical insurance premium and other assistance and support mechanisms which aim to build resilience to the impact of natural hazards.

"Parametric Insurance" is a form of catastrophe insurance that covers mostly unusual weather events. It is a type of insurance that does not indemnify the pure loss, but ex ante (before the event) agrees to make a payment upon the intensity on the occurrence of a triggering event. It is a type of insurance, reinsurance or risk transfer arrangement that does not indemnify the full loss for the protection buyer. Under a Parametric Insurance contract, the parameters on which the ultimate payment is calculated normally include a weather or geological observation index, like rainfall over a defined period or average temperature or wind speeds for hurricanes, the intensity of an earthquake at specific locations. The lack of adequate insurance against natural catastrophe is very acute, especially in developing countries. It is a sad reality that the developing nations like Haiti are often the most exposed nations to natural catastrophes and they are also the least equipped to shoulder such losses.

This took place on the night of July 27 and 28, 2016 in Cite Blue Hills in cap-Haitian where 36 year old Anne-Rose Bel-Amour perished in a fire with her two children Nowens Jean age 3 and 4 day old baby Kervens Jean, and another relative, Vedeline Compere who was 6 years old. The origin of the fire has not yet been determined; howeve, according to Horace Jean, the father of the baby, in the room where the fire seems to be originated, there was a lamp and a gallon of gasoline stored there as well. This probably explains why the fire started so quickly without giving anyone there at the time a chance to evacuate

A violent 7.8 magnitude earthquake hit Ecuador last Sunday morning. The death toll has soared to 272 and Vice President Jorge Glas had estimated that more than 2,527 people were injured. There have been reports of extensive damage in the southwest of the country such as Guayaquil and coastal Manabi Province where it is hard to reach the victims. The cities of Manta, Portoviejo and Pedernales were the most devastation but he entire country is affected.

There is a large Haitian community living in Ecuador and some of them are expected to be among the victims of this 7.8 magnitude earthquake. According to the most recent estimates, more than 30,000 Haitians are living in Ecuador. So far, not many relatives and friends have heard about them.

There are not too many family members left to mourn the death of eight people perished on the night between Sunday, December 20 and Monday, December 21, 2015 in a locality called Morne Dorima in the Port-de-Paix area. The Eight deaths are from a single family who perished when their home collapsed during a deluge. The family members who died include: Midline (20), Lickend (18 ), Erline(15), Jean-Herby (13), Masline (9), jameson (2), Peterlove (4), and Berlin (one). Only two people survived, a 8 day old child and her mother who have been hospitalized for injuries they received when the house collapsed.

As per news report dated December 17, 2015, the Washington-based financial institution 'Inter-American Development Bank (IDB)' which is one of the main long term economic financiers of the Latin America and the Caribbean, would provide US$42 million grant to Haiti to improve its watershed managements especially in the rural areas. With this fund Haiti will be able to increase its capacity to mitigate the harmful effects of climate change, especially in the agricultural sector and encounter the threats of losses due to floods and land erosion. It would be able to improve its water and sediment conservation in selected gullies of important watersheds particularly in some areas like Centre-Artibonite Loop and enhance the educational capacity of the Faculty of Agronomy and Veterinary Medicine. Haiti's main four targeted projects suffer about $28 million loss, every year. Eighty percent of Haiti's land area is mountainous, only 28% of the land is arable or suitable for cultivation. Agriculture in Haiti is very closely linked to the climate factor which is again very much vulnerable to natural disasters because of Haiti's geographical location on the Caribbean cyclonic belt. Agriculture contributes 25% of Haitian GDP, 5.9% of total export, 71% rural employment and 47% overall employment of the country. IDB considers Haiti as one of the top countries in the index of highest natural disaster risk. Practically, as per the World Risk Index calculated by the United Nations University, Haiti is positioned on the 21st rank (with 11.88% disaster threat). Vanuatu tops the list of 172 countries with 36.43% threat.

For the following days (December 1 to 3) Hurricane Joaquin will be visiting Haiti. You can expect Intermittent rain and scattered thunderstorms, specially in the North, Northeast, Northwest, Artibonite, Centre and Grand Anse.

Disaster has become a big business. Antony Loewenstein, the best-selling journalist after travelling across Afghanistan, Haiti, Pakistan, Greece, Papua New Guinea, the United States, Britain, and Australia has witnessed the reality of disaster capitalism. He has discovered how big companies like G4S, Serco and Halliburton, private contractors, politicians and international aid agencies are cashing in on calamities. Antony Loewenstein is an independent Australian journalist, a Guardian columnist and also writes for the BBC, Nation and the Washington Post. In his recent book, "Disaster Capitalism: Making a Killing out of Catastrophe." Loewenstein has raised the driving question and has given examples how governments and corporations profit from disaster.

The flood of November 2014 brought a new reality to the people in Cap-Haitian. Instead of getting a car, bicycle or a "Bourette", people now realized that they might want to invest in a boat and leave it at home or in their back yard. The use of a boat can actually become very useful in the city specially during flood that tend to occur more frequently.

Whether it is caused by lack of maintenance on the part of the Haitian government in these rivers around the city, a neglect from the public sector to manage garbage collected by the citizens of Cap-Haitian and that the people have no choice but to dispose of their garbage in the streets or it is just an effect of the global warming, we need to get ready.

We have long known that the islands of the Caribbean have been threatened with the event of earthqauakes. The threat having made itself remembered with the catastrophic earthquake that hit Haiti only three years ago. But now, scientists are reminding us that we face another threat brought on by the number of tectonic plates shifting under our very feet, that of tsunamis.

A slightly exotic thought to the Caribbean mind, as tsunamis are often thought of as a far-away phenomena heard about on the news as it happened in some distant country. But historical accounts show that more than 3,500 people have been killed in tsunamis that struck the Caribbean between 1842 and 2010, which is higher than the 579 dead in tsunamis over the same time frame in the more traditionally tsunami-prone areas of the eastern Pacific.

On Thursday, 16 January 2014, the response capabilities of Haiti in the event of major natural disaster was enhanced when the U.S. Ambassador Pamela White accompanied by other officials from U.S Embassy in a handover ceremony in the capital city, donated 12 transport vehicles and 12 watercrafts to Haitian Emergency Response and Civil Protection Agencies. The transport vehicles include six 20-foot, all-terrain cargo trucks, six all-terrain, large cabin pick-up trucks. The watercrafts delivered include twelve 18-foot search and rescue boats.

These trucks and boats were purchased under U.S. Southern Command's Humanitarian Assistance Program to extend Haiti's emergency response capabilities in life-threatening and natural disasters crises. The Haitian representatives from the Ministry of Justice and Public Security accepted the keys of the vehicles on behalf of country's National Police firefighters. The trucks will be used by the Association of Haitian Volunteer Firefighter and these will be added to their existing fleet of disaster relief capabilities in six of the ten Emergency Units built under U.S assistance program for strengthening Haiti's disaster response system.

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